How Rab C Nesbitt found his father...
Actor uncovers origins
AS string-vested philosopher Rab C Nesbitt, he had a lot to say on every subject.
But actor Gregor Fisher had kept quiet about his own early life until now.
Now, in a new memoir, The Boy From Nowhere, Fisher lays bare the tragedy and mystery that surround his upbringing.
He is the son of William B Kerr, a married councillor in his sixties who was almost twice as old as Fisher’s mother, Kit McKenzie, from Menstrie in Clackmannanshire, when they had an affair and the actor was conceived.
His mother, who suffered from a heart condition, would die when he was a baby.
Shortly afterwards, his adoptive mother died in a fire. Aged three, Fisher was taken in by a couple called John and Cis Leckie
In an interview with a Sunday newspaper, Fisher said he thought twice about writing the memoir.
He added: ‘I think it’s a West of Scotland thing, that you shouldn’t put your head above the parapet, and you should keep private things to yourself. So I have mixed feelings about it.’
Fisher still has unanswered questions about William Kerr and would like to know more about the relationship between his mother and father.
He said: ‘ Was it a love affair? Some might like to think so. Was it a case of “a wee wumman I keep up the back”? I don’t know.’
The actor believes a Victorian parlour song of lost love, kept in Mr Kerr’s wallet and passed to him, may have been a memento of his mother.
But he said: ‘Short of you looking into the whites of somebody’s eyes and asking that, trying to work out if they’re lying, how are you going to find out? You know the dates, the times, the places, you don’t know the whys.’
Fisher has pieced his family story together throughout his adult life, and said he has been full of curiosity at times over who he ‘really’ is.
But he has also fought a desire to leave his past alone for fear of what he would discover.
He told the Sunday Times: ‘There have been moments where my reaction to certain things has rattled me and I’ve thought, what’s that all about? I thought all this was done and dusted and properly filed away, in the drawer marked, “Don’t need to look at that again”.’
But the stability of his marriage to actress Vicki Burton, with whom he has three grown-up children, has given him the security ‘to get a stick and prod the past’.
Fisher discovered his biological f ather while r esearching his memoir.
Speaking in May, he said: ‘There have been bits of my life revealed over the years, but not much more than the fact I was an adopted boy.’
For a long time growing up, he believed his father was another man.
He said: ‘People I grew up with would look at this man and then me and say, “You cannae deny that yin”. I remember when I went to drama school and realised I walked with a turned-in foot, as did this particular man. I thought, “There’s no question he’s my father”. But it was all wrong, even though we looked similar.’
Fisher has been able to find connections with Mr Kerr through shared habits.
He said: ‘While nobody outside of my circle knows that I play piano, it turns out my grandfather was a church organist. It’s these things that let you feel that connection. I’ve seen pictures now of my father and I can see the resemblance. It’s really very weird to see.’
Fisher says his book, although an honest investigation of his difficult upbringing, i s not ‘ a misery memoir’.
‘I have mixed
feelings’ ‘Get a stick and prod the past’